1869 -
James A. Garfield, then a congressman from Ohio, announced a new kind of
history, based on statistics, to his colleagues in the House of
Representatives.

“The
developments of statistics are causing history to be rewritten.

Till
recently, the historian studied nations in the aggregate, and gave us
only the story of princes, dynasties, sieges, and battles…

Now,
statistical inquiry leads him into the hovels, homes, workshops, mines,
fields, prisons, hospitals, and all other places where human nature
displays its weakness and its strength. In these explorations he
discovers the seeds of national growth and decay, and thus becomes the
prophet of his generation.”

From a
speech about the Ninth Census that James A. Garfield (Representative
from Ohio) delivered in the House of Representatives, December 16, 1869.